1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system and method for allowing a plurality of consumers to each select his or her own fixed odds and associated payoff (assuming the wager wins) from a common universal drawing by subdividing one drawing event into a series of variable sized “bins” that reduce wagered odds to a subset of the greater overall odds of the universal drawing. This reduction in wagered odds (i.e., greater chance of winning from a consumer's perspective) is achieved by creating a plurality of bins each containing a portion of the possible universal drawing outcomes, the totality of bins thereby containing 100% of the possible drawing outcomes. Additionally, a modulo operation is performed to create a unique pointer for each of the previously created bins. Thus, any desired subset of reduced wagering odds can be achieved with the virtual creation of the corresponding number of bins. This system creates new flexible wagering to allow consumers to fine tune their wagers to whatever risk and reward potential payoffs they desire, thereby greatly enhancing the marketability and desirability of “standard” draw games.
2. Background
Typically, a draw game is a form of gambling that involves wagering on a future drawing of numbers or other indicia in “lots” for a prize. The history of draw games can be traced back thousands of years. By most accounts, draw games originated in China with a game that is now known as “Keno” that was utilized by the state to raise funds for the construction of the Great Wall of China.
Most modern lottery draw games allow consumers to purchase tickets for future drawings with prizes ranging from fixed cash awards to forms of parimutuel or “parimutuality” (i.e., where the allocated portion of winnings are equally shared among all winners of a particular level) payouts. While lotteries and other gaming venues typically allow consumers to choose their own numbers or other indicia, a substantial majority of consumers make wagers via “quick picks”—e.g., allowing a random or pseudorandom number generator to select the wager numbers automatically for a consumer. One possible reason for the consumer's preference for quick picks is that (since it is unlikely that two people will receive the same “random” numbers) the possibility of multiple winners for the same drawing is presumably less, whereas “parimutuality” type draw games inherently can result in the undesirable consequence of a large number of winners for any given drawing, resulting in each winner realizing a significantly reduced prize.
This problem of wagering for a draw game prize where the prize return is uncertain at the time of wager is endemic with most large draw game prizes. For example, if the “parimutuality” game Powerball® realized sales of $100,000,000 with a 50% prize fund and only one ticket had the winning numbers for a given drawing, the ticket holder would be awarded a prize valued at $50,000,000. However, with the same Powerball sales of $100,000,000 and 50% prize fund, if there were two winning tickets for the same drawing, each ticket holder would only receive $25,000,000 instead of the $50,000,000 prize award with a single winner. This reduction in individual player winnings would continue as more winning tickets were identified for a given drawing.
Aside from the problem of potentially varying prize payouts, the classical fixed number of outcomes for a given draw game type dictate various prize tiers that may not be appealing to all types of consumers. For example, assume three different draw games, all with different wager types, all with 100% payouts, and all where each wager costs $1. Thus, the three exemplary draw games could be:                a 1 in 10,000 chance of winning $10,000        a 1 in 100 chance of winning $100        or, a 1 in 2 chance of winning $2In this example, most people would play the long odds game of “1 in 10,000 chance of winning $10,000.” However, if the same three draw games with 100% payout were played where each wager now cost $100 (i.e., a 1 in 10,000 chance of winning $1,000,000; a 1 in 100 chance of winning $10,000; or a 1 in 2 chance of winning $200) most people would probably play the short odds game of “1 in 2 chance of winning $200.” The difference being that for most people the pain of losing $100 is greater than losing $1. Thus, concepts like “price point”, “payout”, and “hit frequency” translate to consumers feeling both satisfaction and pain—or, to put it another way, no existing draw game can work for all consumers because every consumer does not feel satisfaction and pain the same way.        
Some notable attempts have been made to introduce variable odds and payouts into various gambling games—e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,938,196 (Antoja); 6,234,478 (Smith); 8,662,998 (Schueller); and 9,687,740 (Grubmueller). However, Antoja simply teaches implementing slot machine adjustable pay schedules with a predictable payout (column 2, lines 8 through 11) and is therefore limited in its applicability to most draw games as well as its restricted pay schedules enabling only a small amount of variability. These same basic concepts are taught in a different, game dial, embodiment in Smith with consequently the same disadvantages. Schueller teaches the same general concept with the embodiment of electronically swapping various “assets” that in some embodiments can include pay schedules or tables; thereby offering greater variety, but with limited applicability to draw games in general. Finally, while Grubmueller does specifically addresses draw games, the adjustability and variability of Grubmueller is achieved with the inclusion of “side events” that are linked to a “main event” or drawing. Therefore, with Grubmueller the odds, flexibility, and payout of the “main event” draw game remains unaltered with only “side events” or bets offering variability. Thus, the prior art is largely silent on how to introduce variable odds, flexibility, and payouts to a single draw game event.
Prior art related to providing fixed assured payouts with parimutuel wagering systems tend to be focused on horse race tracks (e.g., U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2009/0131132 (Kohls et al.). However, horse race tracks are relatively small networks where delivering parimutuel odds and other data in real time or near rear time does not pose any significant computational challenge, with the actual payouts being available in real time at the time of the wager. In contrast, lottery related draw game systems prior art tends to exclusively focus on new types of games and the systems to support them with no regard to enabling fixed payouts at the time of wagering and/or variable odds, flexibility, and payouts to a single draw game event—e.g., U.S. Patent Application Publication Nos. 2003/0050109 (Caro et al.); 2004/0058726 (Klugman); 2009/0131132 (Kohls et al.); 2009/0227320 (McBride); 2010/0222136 (Goto et al.); 2011/0281629 (Meyer); 2013/0244745 (Guziel et al.); and U.S. Pat. No. 8,747,209 (Badrich).
Therefore, in order to enhance the appeal of draw games to a broader market base, it is highly desirable to develop draw game systems where prize payouts are known at the time of the wager where a consumer or other entity can select his or her desired odds and payout. Ideally, these draw game systems are game type independent, thereby offering the greatest utility to lotteries and other draw game system providers.